About
The conversation I wanted my patients to have before they met me on the labor and delivery unit.
Dr. Shakkaura Kemet-Rosenwohl*, OB/GYN and laborist
The vantage point
I became an obstetrician because I wanted to take care of people at one of the most consequential moments of their lives.
As a laborist, I care exclusively for hospitalized pregnant patients.
01
I manage labor.
02
I perform deliveries.
03
I respond when something changes.
And from that vantage point, I began to notice a problem.
We ask patients to participate in extraordinarily important decisions without always giving them the time they need to understand those decisions before they happen.
Can tell you that an operative vaginal delivery is possible.
That does not tell you how you might feel when someone recommends one.
Can explain that an induction may be necessary.
That does not necessarily give you an hour to understand what induction actually involves.
Can say “I want to avoid a cesarean.”
It cannot tell you what tradeoffs you would be willing to make to avoid one - or what information you would want if avoiding one were no longer the safest option.
Those are different conversations.
And they deserve
Why Virevelle
Long before I became a physician, I was interested in what happens when medical knowledge and patients’ lived experiences fail to meet.
I studied stem cell biology at Harvard and public health at Yale before attending medical school and completing my OB/GYN residency at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF). My writing and research have examined trust, informed consent, race, and the ways patients experience the medical system.
But Virevelle grew most directly from taking care of patients on Labor & Delivery.
01
Harvard
stem cell biology
02
Yale
public health
03
Medical school
becoming a physician
04
UCSF
OB/GYN residency
05
Labor & Delivery
where Virevelle began
On Labor & Delivery
I have seen excellent medicine delivered in frightening circumstances. I have also seen how easily a patient can leave a medically successful birth feeling as though everything happened to them rather than with them or for them.
The difference is not always the outcome. Sometimes it is whether anyone helped them understand what was happening.
Virevelle exists for the part of childbirth that requires something our healthcare system has very little of: time.
Time to
01
ask the question that feels too small for your prenatal appointment.
02
ask the same question twice.
03
understand why your obstetrician might recommend something you hope never happens.
04
discover that the preference you wrote on a birth-plan template isn’t actually your preference once you understand the alternatives.
05
say, “I don’t know how I feel about that yet.”
Truthfully, I don’t know exactly what will happen when you give birth. Neither does anyone else.
My job at Virevelle is not to promise you the birth you want. It is to help you understand the choices you may encounter well enough that, whatever happens, you can remain a participant in your own care.
Dr. Shakkaura Kemet-Rosenwohl*
OB/GYN and laborist